Credit to kromagnon of the xkcd forums for the topic. I would like to see what people here think.
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Are we just the sum of our parts?

The teleportation problem:

1)Disassemble a person atom by atom, transport the atoms(arbitrary distance) and re-assemble. Assuming the person is put back together properly most people would agree that it is the same person.

2)Disassemble a person atom by atom. Save the data of location, spin etc. Disregard original atoms. Assemble the person from a "pile" of "new" atoms. Is this the same person? They certainly believe they are the same person, they have all the same memories, feelings, and dreams.

3)If you answered "yes" to number 2:
Perform #2... Then re-assemble the person using the original atoms. Are they both the same person?
Take this a step further. Assume you are the person being teleported. Is there continuity of consciousness? In other words, which one are you? If I decide to punch one of you in the stomach, do you feel the pain, or do you see your new twin double over?


The brain surgery problem:

This is another way of thinking about #3 on the previous exercise.

Scientists make an exact replica of your brain, atom by atom.

1)They cut out a 1cm x 1cm x 1cm cube of your brain, and replace it with the appropriate cube from the replica brain.
You should notice no difference, right?

2)Repeat #1 until the entire brain is replica.At some point do you stop being "you"? Does your "instance" of consciousness get replaced at some percentage of replica brain? 50%?

3)The cut your brain right down the middle, and share the halves.... (Replica Left | Original Right) and (Original Left | Replica Right) Where does your "instance of consciousness" go? With the left or the right?


Hopefully this is thought provoking and hasn't been done before on these forums.

well the container isn't what makes the person, that is to say the matter that makes up one's brain (or body) is simply the container for memory. if said memory is not lost in translation in either process i see no reason you would be anything other than yourself with a slightly altered container.

as to part 1 (teleportation) question 3..to me that's just a round-about 'technological' way of creating a clone. in this case, however, the copy would, at the moment of conception be a true clone, both physically and mentally including but not limited to shared memories and etc. however, i believe the likeness ends there and there is no further link between the two persons beyond what they shared up to the point of conception. if you send me1 to africa and me2 stays in the states, i accrue new experiences and knowledge completely independent of my other being at each point, while still maintaining the pre-separation shared memories and experiences. it's kind of like if you took identical pictures of a man's face and gave it to two different children and told them to add accessories to the men with their crayons. one may draw a necklace on the man, while the other draws some earrings. the more malicious of the two decides to put the man's eye out and give him an eyepatch, but the other picture doesn't suffer the same fate because even if they were identical, down to the molecular level, they are still made up of different matter. as far as i know, matter can't be in two places at once, at least not by the known laws of physics, what happens beyond the event horizon of a supermassive black hole, who's to say anyway i'm rambling now and it's 530 in the morning what the hell am i doing on here

complicated

If you were to theoretically disassemble a person by atoms and reassemble them in a different location, either the same atoms or using different ones, and somehow not kill the person in the process you would still have the problem of bringing their original mental stream to the newly located atoms.
I believe "consciousness" and the brain are separate entities all together.

For your teleportation problem, #1 has already been done. Scientists have been able to teleport atoms within short distances
http://www.time.com/time/health/article/0,8599,1874760,00.html

I haven't read anything about #2 but if you could point me to some articles on that one I'd be interested on reading about that technique.

Sounds impossible to me. Our memories are stored atom for atom - not being 100% accurate would/could kill the person or permanently fuck them up.

presumptions:
1) the definition of "same person" is "mentally the same person", not physically
2) the definition of "consciousness" is the "subjective experience or awareness or wakefulness or the executive control system of the mind"
3) consciousness is brought about by the physical interaction of neurones, these interaction alone is sufficient to generate consciousness.

thus, for teleportation case, the two dupe are mentally the same person. yet this is only true in the moment right after the dupe, because as time goes on the dupes will experience different things.

for the brain surgery problem: it doesnt work because consciousness is the sum of different sense like "taste", "vision", "hearing" and such....if you cut the visual cortex, you will loss vision, if you cut auditory cortex you will loss hearing etc. and to a higher degree, the thinking ability is brought about by the neurological action from the frontal cortex, prefrontal cortex, orbital frontal cortex, frontal eye field and such. each cut will take away the part of consciousness that the anatomical part is responsible.


hope that explains.

I actually think the "answer" is rather simple..

I dont have a theory about this my self, but history has shown us that even complicated matters have very simple solutions/answers etc.

This, the two people would seem completely similar but in actuality be different, since matter cannot be in two places at the same time. However, they would behave the same, be perceived the same, etc.

Quantum mechanics actually says that matter CAN be several locations at the same time